Many automated ice making machines have moving parts used to direct water and ice moving within the ice making machine. In many cases, these moving parts can become jammed by ice trapped by and/or within such moving parts. Resulting service calls for clearing jammed parts of trapped ice lead to unnecessary expense and maintenance of ice making machines. Also, one or more sensors often used to control operation of ice making machines based upon the position of a movable ice making machine part can produce false signals or can fail to produce necessary signals for proper machine operation. As a result, ice making machines can produce too much ice, can stop producing ice prematurely, or can malfunction in other manners. Clearly, in light of these and other problems and issues arising with respect to existing ice making machines, new ice making machines and methods would be welcome in the art.